Syllabus
List of lectures:
1. Opening lecture. Introduction, conditions of attestations, etc. / Before socialism: “Tramping” and Jazz (a brief look into the local “prehistory”)
2. Collectivisation of music industry in the early 1950s, the rise of pop music in the late 1950s and the return of jazz in the 1960s
3. Rock’n’roll, British Invasion, Hippies (Birmingham school of cultural studies)
4. “Underground” and “Alternative“. Rock music and cultural resistance in the 1970s
5. New wave and the colourful 1980s (Neo-tribes?)
6. Inhospitality of everyday life. Punk and violence in the late state socialism
7. Perestroika and „Rockfest“. New distinction of nonconformity after 1986
8. Import of western gramophone records, DIY cassette tapes samizdat and the “Imaginary West”
9. Comparison with other socialist states (Transnational history)
10. Revolution, transformation, continuities / Final lecture. Conclusions. Debates.
Annotation
Numerous subcultural communities were formed in each decade of socialist Czechoslovakia, from the jazzmen of the late 1940s to the Depeche Mode fans of the late 1980s. At the same time, there were hundreds of bands and thousands of historical actors in each generation. In the 1980s, there was, in addition to rock subgenres (punk, new wave, metal...), also a big boom of musical genres like reggae, new romantics, industrial etc. This specialized lecture will try to provide several ways how to investigate these phenomena without oversimplification.
The course will proceed chronologically. Possible conceptual understandings will be presented for each individual topic, in addition to empirical interpretation. Each lecture will be supplemented with audio-visual and material examples (records, cassettes, printed materials). The course primarily aims on students interested in contemporary history of central-eastern Europe. The lecture is suitable for those working on a bachelor's or master's thesis specialised on this topic. But not only these - all interested students are welcome.